Polish aid

“It is with great pleasure and pride that I take part, as a representative of the Polish government, in the inauguration of the medical mission, commissioned by the WHO and organised by the Polish Centre for International Aid with the support of the Polish Army,” said Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Paweł Jabłoński, while seeing off a team of 23 doctors, nurses and paramedics of the Polish Centre for International Aid (PCPM), who are to launch their medical mission in Tajikistan.

Poland supports its neighbours again in their fight against the COVID-19 epidemic. Today, another humanitarian aid convoy of over 40 trucks sets off to Belarus, carrying in total 300 tonnes of protective equipment and supplies.

Over 300,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) stay in camps in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.

In January 2020, the Polish Challenge Fund was launched to support the scale-up of Polish innovations and to increase the positive impact of development activities. With the financial support from the Polish Aid programme, coordinated by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland and implemented by the UNDP Regional Hub in Istanbul, 5 selected Polish innovations are going to be effective drivers of change in Ukraine and Republic of Belarus.

Closed borders, compulsory quarantine, and a locked-down economy have put on hold numerous planned development initiatives for Ukraine. However, needs are piling up. They include not only tasks related to the fight against the COVID-19 epidemic, but also those addressing its consequences which will hit the poorest most.

The whole world keeps fighting COVID-19. Poland not only looks after its own citizens but also supports its neighbours and Eastern Partnership countries. The Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs analyses the situation so that the support it provides is well-targeted and effective.

Despite restrictions imposed following the spread of COVID-19, Polish aid has not stopped its efforts to help establish mountain rescue structures in Georgia. It has been three years now that Georgians have received support from the ICAD Foundation.

In addition to the support that reached our eastern neighbours in the convoy, Poland will provide financial assistance to Belarusian hospitals, social welfare centres and non-governmental organisations that have turned to the Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Minsk for help in fighting the COVID-19 epidemic.

Bogdan Rudkowski, a doctor with Caritas Mariupol working in Donbas, writes about helping those in need in Ukraine’s front-line area:

In the early hours of 24 April 2020, the first of six lorries in the convoy reached the Grodno Regional Clinical Hospital for Infectious Diseases.